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In November I visited the VMware users group for the Phoenix area and one of the big topics was P2V.

Not enough can be said about all the challenges there are to successfully convert physical servers to virtual servers (P2V), especially when your data center has hundreds of servers with various configurations and operating systems.

Sometimes a P2V is done in about 30 minutes, while other times it’s almost impossible because of all the planning due to dependencies like databases, unsupported applications, unsupported operating systems and finally unforeseen gotchas that happen.

Something I got from the VMUG was a P2V check list that Matt Mancini created to make his server migrations easier. I am attaching the file for your use as well as a link where you can visit the VMUG website. <link>

It’s always a best practice to plan your P2V, especially if the server is a production or mission critical server that can’t be powered off for very long.

Kudos to Matt for sharing the P2V checklist file with the group and I look forward to the next VMUG meeting.

Link to download P2V checklist –> Download

We’ve added a new feature to VMinstall.com which will be very useful to the virtual infrastructure community, SimplePress Forum.

Our goal for the new year is a single community for many of the virtual environment vendors i.e. VMware, Hyper-V, Xen, Virtual Iron, and others here on the VMinstall.com. We invite you to help support our website by joining the forum community and sharing your expertise and experience(s). <go to forum>